Bruce Wayne: "He locked up half of the city's criminals, and he did it without wearing a mask. Gotham needs a hero with a face."

Batman was the greatest superhero ever. That's what I decided after me and Brittany spent a summer Saturday afternoon seeing "The Dark Knight." Well, I saw it. Brittany just covered her eyes half of the time.

"This is fucking awesome," I whispered into her ear, my tan elbow nudging hers off of the armrest in excitement. "Aren't you glad I snuck us in?"

She made a little whimpering noise that sounded kind of similar to the one she made whenever I kissed her. Then I felt fucking weird, you know, associating the Joker's murder sprees with Brittany's tongue in my mouth. But I bit my lip and bore through it.

When the movie was over, Brittany gave me her best attempt at a dirty look and hissed, "I wish I had an eraser for my brain so I could erase this movie from it. I hate you."

"No, you don't. I'm awesome," I countered, flicking my eyebrow up and grinning. "And I've also come to the conclusion that Batman is the greatest superhero ever."

"Why?" she asked as we took the long way home.

"'Cuz he's all dark and damaged and vengeful. His only real powers are his intelligence and his anger at the world. That's what a superhero should be. None of that 'faster than a speeding bullet' crap."

I turned my head to examine why Brittany wasn't bowing down to my incredible conjectures regarding the world of superheroes. She had popped a finger in her mouth and was chewing on the cuticle.

"Quit it," I said, swatting at her hand.

"I think superpowers are cool," she finally answered.

"Whatever..."

I blew it off. Clearly she couldn't wrap her head around the amazingness that was inside of my own. We walked through the woods near her house in silence, my feet shuffling over grass and then gravel.

"What's this?" I asked her, stopping in front of some huge canyon full of pebbles and sand.

"I don't know," Brittany muttered. "It just showed up here a few days ago. I thought maybe a really big UFO crashed here or something."

I gave her my patented "Oh, Brittany" sigh that was a combination of amusement, love and confusion over how her brain worked. Not that I'd ever tell her that I liked it.

"It's a rock quarry," I told her.

"Oh."

I walked out to its edge, peering into the vastness. It must have been like 20 feet wide and 100 feet deep!

No, not really.

Brittany grabbed my arm, my T-shirt rising at the side as she tugged me backwards. "Don't," she begged.

"Don't what?"

"You're gonna jump."

I scoffed at her, laughing. "Oh, please. No, I'm not."

Well, that was a fucking lie. The truth was, I just thought it'd be exciting, but now it seemed there was a much bigger opportunity at work here.

"Okay, Brittany," I started. "I'm gonna show you something."

"What?" she said, her blue eyes widening into blue globes.

"Regular people can be superheroes too. Just like Batman. You don't need to be superfast or invincible or have the ability to fly or whatever. You just have to be strong on the inside. Watch me." I walked back to the edge of the quarry, a clutch of pebbles shimmering under my sneaker then shooting downward.

"Please don't, Santana!" Brittany cried out, squeezing my hand in her sweaty fingers. "It's not strong to be stupid."

But, before I could think up some witty reply to her statement, I'd taken a flying leap into the belly of the rock quarry.

I only felt like Batman for a second though. That's all there was of that- one fucking second- soaring through the dusty, humid air. Then the whole stunt turned into something entirely different.

I heard Brittany scream and start to cry. I heard my legs make a weird BOOM noise, and then the sound of gravel filled up my head like it was being shoveled inside of it. My feet landed in a stab at the base of the quarry, a burn climbing all the way up them and into my legs, striking my chest. I closed my eyes and waited for God to take me. Or Satan. You know, whoever was really in charge.

It wound up being Brittany. "Santana!" she cried. "Santana, are you dead?"

My lashes fluttered open slowly, two baby mouths that weren't sure that they still wanted to keep eating. I looked down at my body. It was covered in dirt and scratches, crosshatched squares of blood gleaming in the evening sun.

"Santana?" Brittany repeated. "Oh, my God, you're dead! But I love you! You can't be dead yet!"

"I'm not dead," I shouted. "You can see that my eyes are open, can't you?"

"Yeah."

"So I'm not dead then."

I probably should have been. I stood up, dusting a brown cloud from my ass. Man, did it it fucking hurt. It felt like someone had stuck a knife up there. It hurt to walk too, but no way in hell I was gonna look like a total Lima loser in front of Brittany. Plus I still had that point to make.

"Idiot," I breathed to myself.

It took a while, but somehow I managed to dig my throbbing toes into the corner of the quarry and drag myself up and out. When I collapsed on the ground in a puddle of blood, dust and gasping, Brittany looked down at me and wiped the tears from her eyes. Jesus, she was never subtle.

"I hate you," she choked out.

I crawled to my feet on my own, brushing a bunch of bloody gravel off of my shirt. "See," I said. "I was right." I gave her a smile that made my chest feel like it was suddenly a balloon and was gonna get punctured. "I'm just as strong as Batman."

"It's not strong to be stupid," she told me one more time.

As if I'd forgotten.

Brittany took my arm. I tried really really fucking hard not to wince, but all of the pain I was holding inside made my eyes start to water. I looked off into the woods as she carried me back to her house.